Joseph Turner

Joseph Turner (1913-14 November 1944) was a US Army 1st Lieutenant who commanded 1st Platoon, US 1st Infantry Division during World War II.

Biography
Joseph Turner was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1913, and he was commissioned as an officer in the US Army after graduating from West Point in 1938. In 1939, he befriended 2nd Lieutenant William Pierson, and the two of them fought with the US 1st Infantry Division at the Battle of Kasserine Pass in 1943. Turner demoted Pierson after he got much of his squad killed by disobeying orders at Kasserine, and Pierson would become a Sergeant in Turner's platoon. Turner and his platoon would go on to take part in the D-Day landings in Normandy on 6 June 1944, and the squad fought its way through Normandy to Paris, Belgium, and Germany. On 14 November 1944, he was wounded at the Battle of Hurtgen Forest after saving PFC Ronald Daniels from the crew of a German tank. Turner, who knew that his wounds were mortal, decided to stay behind and hold off the Germans as his men retreated from the hill, and Turner was gunned down by advancing German troops. Pierson took over the squad, leading it in his own callous style, as opposed to Turner's team-oriented leadership.